Are These Fans of the Blue Waah-ve?

John Nash

Published 7:00 pm, Thursday, February 5, 2009

Well Wilton's 5-4 win over Darien on Wednesday night certainly has the FCIAC hockey folks talking and it's also got a bunch of Darien fans running to the excuse machine for why they lost to the Warriors.

The FCIAC Hockey Blog had a number of "discussions" on this very topic in the wake of the Warriors stunning victory. (Click here to read such posts) It seems as though, if you believe the posters, Darien's head coach played his fifth line as much as his first line. Hmmm, five lines times three kids per line with three rotations of defenseman and an extra goalie and a couple of extra assistant coaches - that's almost 25 people on a hockey bench. Kinda crowded, I'd say. Perhaps the players couldn't get stretched out enough to compete on this given night, which in the world of sports we all know anything can happen.

Everybody's blaming the Darien coach for losing the game - (I've often wondered who was behind the goalie's mask, I guess it's the head coach) - but no coach in the FCIAC, especially given the rivalry between the towns of Wilton and Darien, is going to lose on purpose, or not put their team in a position to win. Ain't gonna happen, if I may butcher the English language for a second.

Now if Darien and Wilton played 10 times, the Blue Wave would probably win ... what? 7, 8, 9 times the way the programs are right now? Well guess what - on this night, Wilton beat Darien. Period.

Just out of curiosity, too, how come when Wilton loses to Darien, nobody from town whines about all the hockey players who go to prep school instead of playing for the Warriors? How come they don't blame it on anybody else?

Just curious.

What we do know is this: Did Darien look past Wilton on Wednesday? Probably. They are high school kids, after all, and good ol' Trinity Catholic is on the horizon for the Wave. But I think also Darien got a dose of reality in terms of this Wilton team is not like past Wilton teams.

They're better. They're a team. And they're skaing with confidence not seen in these parts in quite some time.